Because the question mentions Google, all the answers for this question are answered within the box of “what currently works online”. The other thing I realize is that tech and direct response/paid search people don’t understand the (rest of the) media world too well and this might be the reason why it’s easiest to simply draw comparisons to Google.

Here’s the thing– the global advertising market is about $600 billion. Direct response/performance based marketing is a fraction of that. If Facebook can figure out a model that can get at the rest of that pie, who says they won’t be more successful than Google?